


Blessing From the Neck Up

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Good Brother Bro, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-12-16
Updated: 2012-02-26
Packaged: 2017-10-27 09:53:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/294436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bro goes deathly silent when you tell him of your resolve to ‘court’ Egbert; leaving out the bit about the ironic implications.  Bro is simply the best there is, and to try and delineate how and why you and Egbert being faux-boyfriends is massively impressive on the irony scale would be insulting to your brother’s intelligence.</p><p>You don’t notice something sailing through the air towards you until it has nearly impacted.  Your first thought is Strife—come at me bro, I’ve got my shitty katana right over here, but—</p><p>It’s not a sword.</p><p>It’s a <i>fist</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pestilence From the Heart Down

****

**  
Now**

  
TG: egbert I know youre there  
TG: john seriously  
TG: i need to talk to you  
TG: to explain myself  
TG: i just  
TG: fuck  
TG: this was never how any of this was supposed to be  
TG: i mean youre my rock  
TG: youve always been my rock, my best friend and confidant and whole shitty closed off world  
TG: like the one paradigm i had of the outside world that wasnt clouded by my perpetual asshole goggles  
TG: jesus christ egderp throw me a rope please  
TG: for gods sake im  
TG: ive spent the last week in a state of self destruct and  
EB: i thought i told you to leave me alone, dave.  
TG: thank gog john jesus fuck im so sorry  
TG: i know that words are fucking shit and nothing can ever  
TG: that is to say  
TG: fuck  
TG: im not good at this  
TG: i mean i cant talk about feelings  
TG: i  
TG: ill rap about it though  
TG: if you want  
TG: I just  
TG: you have to know john  
TG: i never thought  
EB: of course  
EB: because rapping solves everything  
EB: ive been sitting here nursing my black eye and broken ribs and thinking  
EB: gee, i hope dave lays down some sick beats on account of the fact that his mindless mob of followers beat me within an inch of my life!  
TG: i came to the hospital for you  
TG: as soon as i heard you have to believe me  
TG: but vantas made it a federal fucking issue and wouldnt let me see you  
EB: good man  
EB: ill have to thank him for that later  
EB: and you dont get to rap about this dave  
EB: its the shitty scapegoat you always fall back on when youre trying to charm people into forgetting that youre a douche  
EB: and ive spent way too many years with that wool pulled over my eyes already, thanks  
TG: john im trying to apologize  
TG: im prostrate on my fucking knees  
EB: can you tell how moved i am by this, dave?  
TG: you didnt block me dude  
TG: which tells me you want to make up as much as i do  
TG: see not even so much as a make out and get over it joke  
TG: i know there are boundaries  
TG: and i know i pissed all over them  
TG: jesus christ john  
TG: im so fucking sorry  
EB: you know what dave  
TG: what  
EB: i do feel like rapping after all  
EB: you wanted feelings, here they are!  
EB: in a format even you can get without your cagey reputation bullshit twisting it into something unrecognizable:  
EB: Yes, you hurt me  
EB: While you were lurking  
EB: Kind eyes and cool words to signify the evil within  
EB: Perched high on you pedestal with throngs of admirers  
EB: And tails of females that make words sting  
EB: I thought blood was thicker than water but I can’t stand the taste now, how  
EB: Does getting swallowed whole by a bigoted mob sound?  
EB: You took my honest attentions out back  
EB: And lit them on fire with a gallon of gas and a match  
EB: Lost in the flames of rapture that friendship sometimes attracts  
EB: Lost in the heartache of cruelty, frozen stiff, I can’t react  
EB: Hush now wonderful boy  
EB: Chilly words and hatred made coy  
EB: I’ve been punched in the face and spread out on the rack  
EB: You’ve dragged me this far, now there’s no turning back—  
EB: He’s a blessing from the neck up  
EB: But a pestilence from the heart down  
EB: Place your faith in him and you’re guaranteed to drown  
EB: Out to pervert the innocence of affection in the name of his own ego  
EB: But in the light of day his bite is never quite as lethal  
EB: And to the power of love his scorn will never be equal  
TG: egbert no i  
TG: jegus christ I didnt know you could rap  
—ectoBiologist has stopped pestering turntechGodhead—  
TG: oh god please john  
TG: i never mean to  
TG: never you john  
—ectoBiologist blocked turntechGodhead—  
TG: i just  
TG: love you  
TG: fuck  
TG: the only good thing in my miserable goddamn life  
TG: for all these years  
TG: and all i ever did was fuck you up too

 ****

  
**Two Months Ago**   


Back when you two still had baby teeth to do away with in creative schemes involving tiny RV cars and dental floss, he used to call you his favorite. He’s always been the coolest kid on the block, of course, even back when it was only by proxy of his hovering brother, but he still sought you out on the playground and at silent-time, playing with plastic superheroes while you two were supposed to be watching veggie tales or spitting at every girl except Jade ( _“S’cause she’s an on-rary boy, _duh_ John, have you heard how loud she can burp?”_ ) who tried to approach you.

You couldn’t remember a day when his attentions didn’t tickle you pink. You used to pack lunches for the both of you, his Bro notoriously sub-par in all of the _traditional_ parenting routines, and make sure dad always put apple juice in the one you were giving to Dave. You’d paw through your old toy drawers about once a week and find old plastic figurines, tiny Batmen or charmanders to sneak in there too, just for the way his nose scrunched up when he smiled at them, all pointy glasses and freckles across the bridge of his nose like the constellations of a perfect world.

You’re both pretty tough, for little kids, in opposite ways. Dave keeps antagonists at bay with his chilly demeanor, proficient even in the messy days of kindergarten at projecting a condescending enough visage to frighten most of the admiration and the envy away. You were just strong, even back then, in that curious, plucky, kneecaps and elbows way that spoke of a man who’d be strapping when eventually he grew into his own.

Contrastingly, Dave had always been a sliver of a boy, and you were far too guileless and without malice to injure an ant sharing your lunch, let alone another human being. You took care of each other, in this way: attached at the hip practically from the first day you met.

People said your names together: nobody ever endeavored to find Dave without expecting John in stride, and vice versa. You were DaveandJohn, the single entity, giggling and roughhousing and cajoling one another along from dusk until dawn.

And when the other kids would get jealous, asking why he let you monopolize so much of his time, his answer was sanguine and resolute: because he’s my favorite.

You were both only about two apples high back then, of course, but you’d always giggle and lean in to give him a big kiss on the cheek. He didn’t mind it, in those days, just took the little token of admiration with a testy little glare around the room, daring any of the other kids to say anything.

You two were in second grade the first time he flinched away from it. It broke your heart, if you’re being really honest with yourself. Just a little bit. It didn’t matter for long, anyhow: soon enough, he began wearing the shades you gave him religiously, as though to placate the bits of your affection that his flinching and reciting the bro-code had stranded in the cold.

Dave was a sleep cuddler anyhow, which pretty much made up for every scorned peck ever the first time Dave slept over at your house: curling into your side in the wee hours of the morning like you were a furnace, bright blonde hair sticking up every which way. You were both tiny, small enough to fit comfortably in your twin sized pirate ship bed, and when you couldn’t sleep you’d pretend that the two of you were buccaneers going on an adventure together, scouring foreign land for excitements new and exhilarating.

Even when you outgrew the bed, you didn’t outgrow the childish fantasies: Dave and John (and Rose and Jade and Karkat and everybody, though that was too much of a mouthful to have as much impact) against the world.

Things changed a bit, when you reached middle school. You were so docile, all strong shoulders and long limbs offset by a gentleness in your eyes that marked you a target, where Dave was aloof and proud, rapping and flaring and sneering his way effortlessly to the top of the social ladder. He was never mean to you, though. You sat together at lunch in a shady corner of the cafeteria, your bubbly anecdotes a stark contrast to the smooth, almost flippant (if you didn’t know what you were looking for) input of Dave.

You still packed Dave’s food. Still put Pokémon figurines in the bag every once in a while, just to see his face light up, in that barely-there way Dave’s features were wont to do.

Dave didn’t call you his favorite out loud anymore, but that was alright. It was in the curve of his shoulder when the coolkid slouched against you, the timbre of his voice when he began talking almost reverently about this new beat he was working on, come over after school today John, you _need_ to hear this.

For all the public opinion of Dave and his fearsome countenance, you had never believed a lick of it. You knew how Dave acted, the carefully constructed façade of indifference and alienation. You also knew how Dave looked sprawled across his own apartment floor after finishing a cheese pizza near single handedly, soda pop staining his shirt as he belched and smiled when you giggled helplessly at the noise.

These two paradigms evened out your perception of Dave, you suppose. It was a point of guilty pride for you, even back then; _you_ were the only one who got to know that bit of the infamous coolkid, the only one Dave let doodle on his backpack with sharpies or hug him without getting slugged.

Dave had never been an inherently mean person, to you. Scared, yes: scared of disappointing his brother, scared of what other people thought, scared of the monstrous crack of thunder in the night sky. He’d hide almost under you, on the sleepover nights that entailed raging storms outside, and you would tell him the truth as you saw it; that Dave was the bravest person you knew, that it takes so much courage to go out and face the world even with all those misgivings, and you didn’t know where he mustered all of it.

Dave would call you a wuss, or a little girl, without fail the next morning, but he’d also lean himself solidly against you at the breakfast table while he ate his pancakes, all wide, trusting eyes under those dark shades and contentment written in the softness of his features.

You suppose that’s why it gave you such a terrible shock, the first time you see it. Dave being mean, really _mean_ , that is.

You were in eighth grade that year, and thick as thieves. Jade and Rose had joined your merry little band long about two years ago, a cleanly, calming influence that you enjoyed, both inherently kind and impossibly bright in their own unique ways.

When you told Dave this, the coolkid snorted.

“Yeah, they’re special snowflakes alright, Egbert.” You just waved the vitriol off, smiling and nudging at Dave with your shoulder until, with a great, mock put-upon sigh, the other boy began nudging back.

Dave was inherently kind, in his unique way, too. Most people just couldn’t see it, not like you could. Most people went through their entire lives with blinders on, and never bothered looking sideways.

You remember with startling clarity the day this viewpoint of your friend was shattered, even if you wouldn’t admit it to yourself back then. You were in the downstairs math hallway, strutting proudly through the parting sea of kids like the middle-school upperclassmen you were, chins high and eyes bright.

Dave had begun… ribbing a kid in your shared fourth period, for lack of a more descriptive word—shooting snide, uncalled for comments across the table and letting the lemmings who hung off his every word like ‘cliffhanger, hanging from a cliff’ (Dave always gives you shit about using memes from the tv shows you watched as a toddler, but you know he totally finds it hilarious) and continuing the vicious little cycle of ‘call a name, watch him flinch’ like it was prime time television.

It was… unusual, for Dave. Generally his scorn was a one-off type of thing: do something to piss him off and feel the whiplash of his words, but then it was over with, clean slate.

Derrek, you thought, that was the guy’s name. With Derrek, it was like Dave was poking at a raw, angry wound, just to see how far he could push before it got infected. It made you uncomfortable, in ways you weren’t adept enough to name: mostly because you couldn’t pinpoint were the ridicule was stemming from. Derrek was quiet, normally, and unobtrusive. He was in a couple of the photography clubs, he helped out backstage with the school plays—it was nothing to warrant the dogged intent with which Dave was going at him, like a wolf with a bloody steak.

You’re getting off track, though: back to the hallway. Derrek was walking towards them, in the loud and rowdy throng of kids, head down while he focused on something in his hand, oblivious to his surroundings.

You saw the impending collision in slow motion, just a second too late; watching Derrek stumble into Dave’s shoulder like a pedestrian watching a car crash.

You grabbed Dave just in time to stop him from crashing to the ground, getting one fistful of shirt and another of backpack and holding on tight until Dave regained his balance.

Derrek, unfortunately, had no such boon to grasp him, and went sprawling to the floor in an undignified heap, supplies launching themselves out of his half open backpack to skid haphazardly across the linoleum floors.

Quiet kid, Derrek, and nice as can be.

In no way warranting the repulsed sneer Dave gave him as the blonde reached into his backpack, pulled out what was left of the bottle of apple juice you had brought him with lunch (“Seal’s still intact, dude, looks like Mr. Mandel hasn’t gotten to it yet!”) and poured it all over Derrek’s prone frame.

The laughter was the worst, you think in retrospect. Like a pack of hyenas, the kids around them began cackling, Neanderthalic huffing noises from people too insipid to form their own opinion.

And you were _appalled_ , but couldn’t do anything, couldn’t say anything, petrified by mob mentality and a hundred good dogs together gone wild, hooting and hollering around the spectacle.

Later, when you two have escaped the pressing clutches of your peers and are lounging on the couch in his apartment, you ask him about it.

“That was terrible, you know. I’ve never seen Derrek do anything to _anyone_ that would warrant that.”

For a split second, a guilty, cringing sort of shame appears across Dave’s features, made uncomfortable by the shift in your esteem for him. He’s always cared about what you have to say, no matter what his arguments are to the contrary—it’s something you appreciate endlessly.

The expression is gone just as fast as it appears, though, smoothed out and hidden well under a stony poker face that seemed to fool everyone but you and Bro.

“Missed the clue wagon, did you Egbert? And this is why you need your bro Dave around, lookin’ out for you: dude’s a faggot. Flaming fudge-packer, GSA enthusiast, the whole nine yards.”

You look at him blankly for another ten seconds, trying to work out how in the world Dave thought Derrek’s sexuality in any way related to the topic at hand. You’re not naive enough not to be aware of homophobia—it just never really occurred to you that _Dave_ might be one of those people.

Dave was…

Dave was _Dave_.

The lack of relevant comprehension on your face makes Dave start squirming again, mask cracked and fractured at the lack of easy acceptance and cuddly camaraderie you were famous for. His voice is small when he talks again, obviously fishing for an out. “I’m sorry if I upset you, bleeding heart-bert.”

You didn’t want him to be sorry he’d upset you; you wanted Dave to be sorry he’d _done_ it. But you didn’t tell the other boy that. Just nodded and let your head sag, a black iron ball weighing heavy judgment in your gut.


	2. The Foundation is Much Pretter Than What it's Concealing

John is sixteen, and he works at Barnes & Noble. He’s always had a drive to work, to be constructive, going out and making things work on his own merit, thriving on positive reinforcement and doing everything he can to earn the monolithic amount of pride his father has had in him since day one.

Dave doesn’t have a job, but despite the fact that there is never a time of day when he doesn’t have a party he is invited to and could be at, he wanders around the music section and chills ‘inconspicuously’ with John so much that frequent customers just assume he’s staff too, though how they got past the lack of uniform thing (Shades indoors, wow, John is so not surprised it hurts) is beyond John. His manager puts up with the shenanigans only because of Dave’s truly impressive musical knowledge, and the fact that he exercises it helping customers _just_ enough not to get kicked out for loitering.

John likes to think it’s a mark of profound friendship, that Dave seems to so revel in his company, when John has buckteeth and an utter lack of malice, and Dave is a hot item at all times.

No, but that’s not right. John likes to think it’s a mark of something more, if he’s being really honest with himself.

Dave could be mean. It was something John has come to terms with—it wasn’t a compromise, (he refuses to see anything in his friend that wasn’t wonderful, just concedes that some of the greatness was gunked up by social expectation) just a fact, and he was alright with that. Dave is always very careful not to be cruel when John is around.

Suffice to say Dave isn’t mean very often; he doesn’t spend enough time away from John to have the opportunity.

John believes this is because he gives Dave an excuse to be the good guy, and that’s half of why Dave likes being around him so much! He tries to ignore Rose’s pitying expression whenever he expresses this sentiment, because she’s great and all, but what does she know? He and Dave are _bros_.

John is at the customer service counter helping a kindly old lady with a wrinkled walnut face. Dave is leaning against the side of aforementioned counter flicking little paper footballs at him from between a goal he made of paperclips.

John adores Dave too much to get truly mad. Most of the time. For now he ignores it with impressive, practiced stoicism, telling the customer that yes, they do have copies of Water for Elephants in stock, it’s on the third shelf down on the last row in Fiction, thank you very much, have a nice day.

She leaves bewildered, shooting one withering glance back at the hooligan in shades who is waylaying the nice young man who’d assisted her, before toddling off to find her book.

The next paper football Dave flicks, John catches and throws back at Dave’s face. He dodges, of course, making an elaborate show of bending over backwards and then straightening out with a smug little quirk of his mouth, as though if he displays enough bravado John won’t notice how crooked the move made his shades.

It doesn’t work. Giggling, John reaches out and readjusts them, knuckles brushing high cheekbones. He’s the only one Dave lets get this close to his face, his eyes. It makes the curling irritation in John’s gut softer, turning into something embarrassingly reminiscent of butterflies.

“Some people have _real_ jobs, y’know.”

Dave DJs at some local clubs on weekends, making as much money with every few and far between gig as John does in a week, but John really doesn’t mind. There’s something honest about the work he does, interacting with people in a way that’s helpful and meaningful, however trivial, and he wouldn’t switch places with Dave for the whole world.

“So I’ve been told, Egbert. Sounds like it sucks big, hairy—“

 

There’s a girl of four or five passing directly behind Dave, and John has to lunge forward and press the flat of his palm against Dave’s mouth with impressive speed in order to avoid mentally scarring the kid. She’s all blonde pigtails and big blue eyes, and she giggles at the affronted squawk Dave emits from between your closed fingers.

 

And then Dave presses his tongue messily against your hand, reverting right back into those days of ‘I licked it, it’s mine’, and you’re the one squawking in disgust, pulling your hand away and rubbing it on your uniform pants with a pouty little expression that makes Dave chuckle low in his throat.

 

His voice has gotten so deep over the course of the past few years, almost as deep as Bro’s, and it does funny things to the pit of your stomach that you’re not sure you want to own up to.

 

You giggle too in response, a mortifyingly girlish (not that there’s anything wrong with being, y’know, girlish) reaction to infatuation and the aftereffects of a lifetime of adoration making your limbs light and restless.

 

“What are you even doing here, anyway? Weren’t you invited to this, and I quote, ‘swag shindig’ tonight?”

 

It was getting pretty late, actually: you only work on weekends, so it doesn’t interfere with your commitment to your grades, and obviously it doesn’t interfere with your social life, because Dave pretty much views this as hangout time anyway.

 

(He sometimes sits in the children’s section and reads frivolous little storybooks to the kids amassed there, when John is busy looking for something in the backroom or restocking shelves. Stellaluna is Dave's favorite, if the amount of times he chooses to read it to different audiences of adoring little boys and girls is any indicator. He only does it when he thinks John isn't looking though. It makes John’s throat tighten up uncomfortably, warmth that starts in the pit of his stomach curling up through the rest of his body in a wave of something too close to love to be completely safe, watching Dave cross legged on the carpet, crooning to all the children he claims to despise.)

 

“It’s all lies and slander, Egbert. Can you imagine any of the sorry SOBs at our school putting together any event worth going to? I mean, I’d grace it with my presence, but then they might actually think it’s an event worth going to, and stop the endless and frankly terribly necessary process of trying to raise the embarrassingly low bar they’ve set for themselves.”

 

Dave talks to John like John is a coolkid too; privy to all of his thought processes because of course John knows what he is talking about, they're both too cool for school. The thought makes John giggle again, turning his head to the side bashfully in order to avoid letting Dave see the derpy glee that had hijacked his features.

“You just used a really lame turn of phrase in your head, and are now laughing about how witty you are, aren’t you?”

 

John turns his body further away from Dave’s affectionately scrutinizing gaze and laughs harder, bright peals of delight interspersed with little shrieks of giddy chuckles. His dad says his laugh is amazing, so full of joy and so infectious that it could light up a room. Kids at school say it's really, really loud, and that he should be embarrassed by it.

 

(Well, actually, only one kid had said that, and when John told Dave about it with tears sparkling in his eyes, Dave had broken that guy’s nose, so John figures things even out.)

 

Dave pretends to roll his eyes, happiness at John’s delight too obvious in the tilt of his brows and the angle of his hips to be hidden, not by someone who knows him as well as John does.

 

“Oh god, you are, aren’t you? You’re ‘that one guy’, who laughs at his own jokes. I’m best friends with ’that one guy’.”

John’s still laughing so hard that the flush overtaking his cheeks at the words ‘best friends’ is easily hidden.

Small blessings.

“What’s so funny over here?”

 

It’s an inviting baritone, the kind John used to stutter in awe over back when he still had training wheels. Dave nearly jumps out of his skin at Bro’s calm little inquiry, head spinning so fast John wonders how he doesn’t get whiplash to turn and glare at the intruder, in that near-imperceptible way Striders exercised any emotion.

Bro’s expression is gentle neutrality, a look that translates into a smile when you know what to search for, and John grins unrepentantly at him when the older man tips his hat ever so slightly in a gesture of mock-chivalry at him. “Prince John, House of Egbert. Cordialities.”

 

John grins wider, his contagious giggles returning a bit, his next sentence fragmented by them. “S-should I curtsey, Sir Bro, House of Strider?”

 

Bro rocks back on his heels. Translation: familiarity. Indulgence.

 

“Damn right you should.”

 

John grabs the edges of his apron and lifts them, tilting his head forward and crossing his ankles daintily. Bro looks on with obvious approval.

 

Dave seems a bit startled. Dave _always_ seems a bit startled when he sees Bro being nice to John, even though it’s the status quo. Even with Dave’s other friends, Bro is aloof and just a bit intimidating, keeping his careful edge pointed outward in an attempt to protect the essential façade of irony; but with John he just melts, reduced to hair ruffling and soft, encouraging noises whenever John begins blabbing about his usually fairly mundane day to him.

 

It’s good, no doubt, Dave fucking hates it when Bro scares away his friends, it’s just strange.

 

Dave asked him about it once, when he was in fourth grade, and Bro had just cradled and shushed a sobbing John to sleep on a playdate to the park (“S-she called my teeth ugly!”).

 

Bro had looked at him with an uncommon honesty that had made Dave squirm a bit in his light-up sneakers, and told him that once in a while you meet the salt of the earth in a sea full of shitheads.

They’ve since had a relationship so nurturing and kind it makes Dave want to throw up in his mouth a bit, in the nicest way possible.

 

Always a man of the moment, he breaks the mood. “Yes yes, we get it: you’re a tool, Egderp’s adorable. Any particular reason you’ve decided to grace us with your presence?”

 

Bro actually smirks a little: he always seems to find it hilarious when Dave gets snippy, tone going low and patronizing with predictability that would be incredibly un-ironic if it weren’t so effective. “You’ve got a semester test tomorrow, asshat. It’s off to beddie-bye with you, say goodnight to your little friends now Davie.”

 

Dave turns red in the face. John continues snickering helplessly.

 

Eighteen expletives and a furious order from John not to strife in his workplace later, Bro is shepherding Dave off towards the exit with a quick kiss to the side of John’s head, making Dave mock-gag as he fist bunps John on the way by and gives him a plaintive look of ‘what’s a bro to do’.

 

It’s nearly closing time: one of his co-workers has locked the front door, so now traffic can only leave, and the overhead speaker is ringing out with the ‘we close in fifteen minutes’ warning.

John shuffles the papers on the desk back into near-order and begins shutting down the computer, stopping stock-still when he glances to the side and sees the very top of a blonde head peeking over the side of the desk.

It’s the same little girl from earlier: still all curly pigtails and deep dimples, missing a tooth on the left side of her mouth.

 

When he smiles at her she waves exaggeratedly, some strange sort of lizard looking toy with blue goop bubbling out of its mouth clutched in one of her chubby child fists.

 

“Are you lost, little miss?”

 

She giggles at him again, one hand fisting in the folds of her long dress in an ‘aw, shucks’ motion that makes John nearly melt.

“No, momma’s lookin’ through the non-fit-chun books, but I can’t read real well yet, so I came explorin’.”

John is a pile of sappy goo on the floor by this point, only barely resisting the urge to scoop her into his arms and adopt her on the spot.

“Did you need something, then?” His tone is gentle; he’s always been kind to kids. He’s always been kind to _everybody_.

She glances around the store conspiratorially, wide blue eyes narrowing with playful suspicion before she leans in and shout-whispers louder than her actual talking voice at him: “Are you and Mr. Shades gonna get _married_? Can I be a flower girl? I _love_ flowers!”

John has decided. He will quit his job and nag this girl’s mother until he can babysit her _every day of the week_ , because jegus Christ she is the cutest thing since fluffy ducklings.

Looking around with the same mock-distrust, he leans exaggeratedly over the counter and shout-whispers right back at her.

“As soon as he realizes how in love with me he is, you’ll be the first person I call!”

\---

Dave kicks bro in the shins as the older Strider tries to drag him out to the car, wrestling out of his grip with a sharp, toothy “I’ve gotta piss like a racehorse you douche, lemme go!”

It’s not entirely true—yes, he does need to empty his bowels, but mostly it’s a juvenile way to piss Bro off that the older man can’t contest. Dave thinks he’ll stop and continue his chat with Egbert on his way back from the washroom: if there’s one surefire way to dump metaphorical fire ants in Bro’s briefs, it’s lollygagging, and the raging shitsicle deserves it for the ‘Davie’ barb—

Especially since it was John who invented the nickname, back when they were tykes, and John was the only one who had _ever_ been able to get away with using it.

He’s stalking his way back to the customer service counter when he hears John’s voice—which is unusual, because the vast majority of his co-workers were raving douche bags (he’s paraphrasing, but who can blame him, a lesser man could be blinded by the sunshine that shoots out of John’s ass.)

The first thing he notices is the pitch—wow that’s high, and he’s considering selling whatever full grown person has a voice in that octave to the circus when he peers up through a couple of bookcases and realizes it’s a little girl, stuffed toy and all.

Of course John is talking to a toddler. It’s a miracle he isn’t cuddling puppies while he’s at it.

She’s smiling almost as wide as he is, as they converse in the shittiest hushed tones Dave has ever heard—

 _“As soon as he realizes how in love with me he is, you’ll be the first person I call!”_

It takes a second for Dave’s legs to start working again.

When they do, he high tails it the fuck out of there.

Dave doesn’t have an answer for Bro when he asks why the fuck he’s being so quiet on the drive back to their apartment.

If he were inclined to be loquacious, though, he’d probably tell his brother what he’d heard.

Tell him that the most disturbing part of listening to something like that was the fact that he _wasn’t_ disturbed by the thought at all.

\---

You are Dave Strider, and you have a plan all worked out by the time you burst noisily into your living room. You’re a cool guy: the epitome of chill in every possible arena, period.

If you weren’t so full of bravado, you’d realize how scared shitless you are. Your plan involves combating fear in your typical fashion, which you would realize is a really shitty way to deal with scenarios involving _actual people_ if you weren’t so caught up in your own bullshit.

When in doubt, headbutt it like a belligerent ram.

You’re going to ask Egbert out on a yes-homo man-date.

In the heat of the moment, you think it’s a perfect fix; at the intersection of hilarious and ironic, a perfect way to shake John off whatever trail of shitty cake-crumbs he’s been following _and_ reassert your masculinity. It’ll be too strange to deal with, on a myriad of levels; John’ll back off the sausage train, and you’ll have saved your poor piteous friend another massively bad lifestyle choice (the love of Nic Cage is bad enough without a modifier.)

It never occurs to you to think of it in terms of ‘homosexuality’. There’s nothing faggy about what you’re going to be doing: _you’re_ not a fag, and Egbert is… _Egbert_ , he just needs a shove in a direction less creepily awkward to get him back on the bro train.

Bro goes deathly silent when you tell him of your resolve to ‘court’ Egbert; leaving out the bit about the ironic implications. Bro is simply the best there is, and to try and delineate how and why you and Egbert being faux-boyfriends is massively impressive on the irony scale would be insulting to your brother’s intelligence.

You don’t notice something sailing through the air towards you until it has nearly impacted. Your first thought is Strife—come at me bro, I’ve got my shitty katana right over here, but—

It’s not a sword.

It’s a _fist_.

Bro has distinctive hands, the kind you quietly admired when you were younger, and are proud to have grown into—a curiously broad, rectangular palm with fingers so long that the nails capping them are curiously rectangular too, the lowest joint of his thumb far out and angular. It’s a huge, frightening paw coming at you (not that you’ll ever admit it), sailing so near your face that you feel the breeze coming off of it. You nearly jump out of your skin when it crashes into the plaster wall right next to your face, a gaping hole punched through the wallpaper that makes debris fly out onto your cheek and catch in your eyebrows.

Bro looks—he looks thunderous, the lines of his face angled down at you so you get a good gander at the crimson of his iris’, always a shade darker than your happy candy-apple color, the limbal ring surrounding it a deep maroon made furious by the scowl of Bro’s mouth and the tilt of his brow.

You don’t think you’ve ever seen him like this, not directed at _you_.

“You better not be fucking that kid around, Dave. Egbert doesn’t deserve your bullshit.”

Like a phantom, Bro is gone the next second. Dave tries to pretend his diaphragm isn’t shaking, that his hands don’t tremble traitorously when he reaches for the knob of his bedroom.

He doesn’t get any sleep that night.

\---

Dave is on Pesterchum, the red of his text glaring at you from your screen like the wrath of an angry god. It’s six thirty in the morning. You have to start getting ready for school in half an hour.

…since when does Dave get up before you do?

You’re reluctant to leave the snug cocoon of covers you’re buried under, head nuzzling further against the down pillow half under it with a murmur of bliss, but the ‘ping’ of Dave’s text just won’t _stop_ and jegus, it _must_ be important if Dave is up at this hour nagging you about it.

— turntechGodhead began pestering ectoBiologist—  
TG: hey john  
TG: i know youre up  
TG: you wake up at like four in the morning to put out water for the deer that eat your garden and to frolic through the fields out back your house singing about living hills  
TG: these are ironclad facts   
EB: you got me dave, i both live with seven midgets and am a nun turned nanny in nazi threatened austria.  
TG: good man  
TG: admitting you have a problem is the first step  
EB: haha, dave, you’re soooooo funny. :B  
EB: seriously though, how are you up?  
EB: i thought your bone marrow rots slowly from the inside every time you wake up before seven fifteen in the morning?   
TG: it does  
TG: im in indescribable amounts of pain here egbert  
TG: bro is hooking me up to morphine as we speak  
TG: but what i have to say is fucking important so im dealing with it   
EB: i’m profoundly honored dave   
TG: youd better be  
TG: also im prefacing this entire conversation with the fact that you are just about as subtle as a goat bleating loudly and pissing on my turntables  
TG: if were measuring this shit on a scale of one to egbert   
EB: i am suddenly very curious as to where this conversation is heading.   
TG: as you well should be  
TG: continuing now from where i was so rudely interrupted   
EB: totally, dave, i’m sooo ruuuude! :B   
TG: the rudest  
TG: but seeing as youve been slobbering over my man meat in a totally non platonic way since the dawn of time   
EB: oh god  
EB: dave, i’m  
EB: im so sorry, i never meant to creep on you, i promise i won’t do anything about it and i won’t tell anyone and   
TG: nonono  
TG: calm your tits Egbert  
TG: i was just thinking we could go out some time and like  
TG: see a really shitty movie or whatever  
TG: if youre up to it   
EB: dave, are you asking me on a date?   
TG: are you saying yes to aforementioned hypothetical date   
EB: yes  
EB: yesyesyesyesyes! 

\---

You are John Egbert, and this is possibly the happiest day of your life.

\---

You are Dave Strider, and you have no idea what you've just gotten yourself into.


	3. Trust Me I'm A Thief

Karkat bears the brunt of John’s excitement the next day. The cantankerous boy shares John’s first period Zoology and Botany class, and through all of his acidic bitching and barbs, he’s actually _very_ considerate about matters of the heart.

John doesn’t see Dave until lunch—plenty of time to get this out of his system before then.

The bespectacled boy considers drawing out telling Karkat that Dave asked him out (Dave asked him out _Dave asked him out_ he knew what John’s blushes and brushes and adoration meant oh God oh Heavens) until Karkat finally had to pry it from him, too nosy about romance _not_ to.

It’s a plan that goes swirling down the shitter the instant Karkat’s actually in his line of sight, walking through the halls towards room E112 and oh goodness gracious—

“Karkat! _Karkat!_ ”

The other boy spins, and for a split second, there’s an expression wonderfully close to happiness, or at least some form of camaraderie, on his face. It’s schooled into his usual look of indignation and offense almost quickly enough that John doesn’t notice.

“Fantastic. _Outstanding._ Best way to start my day, really Egbert.”

John doesn’t miss a beat. “I know, right!”

And then he’s grabbing the shorter boy by the arm and dragging him towards a wall, where they’re not impeding the flow of people, and leans in to whisper in his ear.

At first Karkat looks pissed—I don’t want to hear about whatever shitty secret you’re about to tell me, let go of my arm—

 _”Dave asked me out on a date!”_

The way Karkat chokes and sputters is entirely too gratifying, but John doesn’t really blame himself for enjoying it. Karkat’s jaw works furiously for a few seconds with nothing coming out, the motions popping and grinding, before with a great heave he turns the tables and drags _John_ off to the bathroom, spinning around to face him as soon as he’s made sufficiently sure that the stalls are empty and that his jumbo eraser is, in fact, jamming the door shut.

“ _Details_ , Egbert, _now_ , and you’d better not be fucking with me.”

John shakes his head that no, he’s not, and begins to gush.

By the time the ‘get to class’ bell rings they have things mostly worked out, though Karkat looks like he wants to shuffle John away to somewhere with bean-bag chairs and make him give up every painstaking detail of he and Dave’s interactions since preschool.

 _”Just don’t change, would be my best advice, I suppose—you’re both kind of useless, but him a **lot** more so than you, so remember you have that high ground. It’s not like he’s attracted to your looks here—don’t stare at me like that, you came to me because I’m honest—so it’s definitely that derpy charm that sets the dopamine in him swimming; just keep doing your thing._ ”

It’s part of why they get along so well—John knows Karkat doesn’t _really_ think he’s ugly, just like Karkat knows that John will never make it public knowledge that he cries at almost every movie he goes to see.

He makes Karkat swear to secrecy too, of course, but it’s more of a formality—for all of the other boy’s… less than textbook niceties, he knows Kar keeps close wraps on delicate subjects. He’s not really sure how public Dave is going to be with this whole thing, but John’s not going to push it.

Not that it wouldn’t hurt, if Dave didn’t want anyone to know, but he’d understand where he was coming from. All these years of ‘no homo, no homo,’ and now with John…

In class, John sinks down in his chair a bit and sighs dreamily, earning him funny looks from his classmates. He honestly couldn’t care less.

\---

Dave is doing acrobatic fucking pirouettes off the handle by the time lunch rolls around the next day. He supposes that’s how things are supposed to be progressing, really—it has to be strange, strange enough for even John to realize ‘Whoa, sorry dude, this was a bad idea!’—but it’s still disquieting.

John is John. _His John_ , since he knew how to use possessive pronouns. It seems fundamentally wrong, to feel so uneasy at the thought of John now; other people yes, but not Egbert, never Egbert.

He’s sitting kiddy-corner to the cafeteria doors when he sees John enter with Jade, his distinctive, ringing laughter painting fresh color on walls and backpacks and tables.

Dave has to smile at that, trepidation breaking down into a thousand more manageable emotions at the sight of John’s guffawing. John’s buckteeth are showing, hair sticking up all over the place—this is the kid he adores, the guy who knows that his brother runs a puppet porn ring and that he is scared shitless of cockroaches, and _still_ thinks he’s the coolest kid around.

(Suddenly, all the uneasiness is gone, replaced by a calm that sits resolute in his stomach and makes his limbs light and weightless with happy. He’s not sure if that’s good or bad.)

John shuffles over to him with a broad gait and shoulders that curved in on his chest: excitement warring with nerves.

When the blue eyed teen nestles down next to him, it’s with a lot less fanfare than usual, his hands kneading at the bottom of his ‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’ T-shirt and okay, maybe not _all_ of Egbert’s movies suck, but that’s _only_ because of Rose’s additions to his legendarily shitty collection.

“I… _hiya_ , Dave!”

His eyelashes are long and full, but not curved like the girls in magazines’—instead they’re straight and downward pointing, bottom and top lashes criss-crossing to form soft-looking ‘x’s when the other boy blinks. Dave is kind of startled to realize that this is something he’s known about John for a very long time, consciously or not. He wonders when he began to take notice of things like that.

And Dave wants to be stiff and awkward in reply, to speed his master plan along, but in the face of how obviously stress-wracked John is he can’t bring himself to do it, to put his best bro in a position like that, so instead he makes the lilt of his voice kind, like nobody else ever gets to hear it, and slouches comfortably.

“Hey there, handsome.”

The ‘handsome’ bit—it was meant to make John uncomfortable and on edge, because they’re both, y’know, **not homosexuals** , not _really_ , but instead it comes out too sincere-sounding for that, and just makes a penny lane pink flush dance across the bridge of John’s nose and paint what shows of his clavicle.

It’s an achievement that makes Dave proud, before he can stop to wonder why.

John is grinning, _grinning_ , and leans in to bump the tips of their noses together with a shy little squeak of joy, and okay, Dave thinks, that’s, that’s—

 ~~Fucking. Adorable.~~ Downright strange.

But it makes him smile too, smile so wide that although his mouth is shut, because, y’know, that showing yer pearly whites stuff isn’t really a thing that Striders do, his ears move just a little bit back on his head.

…because he’s trying to make John… uncomfortable. Right.

(He’s running out of justifications for this ‘thing’ at an alarming rate, and really, he _did_ think that this wasn’t going to be a viable thing at the beginning, but now that it ~~is~~ might be he doesn’t know what to do with himself, doesn’t have a plan B, and John’s bony hip is so damn warm where it’s been scooted over to settle against his own—)

“So, I was thinking, just to kind of avoid the first date jitters thing, which is kind of, y’know, _stupid_ since we’ve known each other like _forever_ , that we could just watch that shitty movie at your place tonight, if that’s ok?”

The entire spiel was exhaled in one massive breath, hopeful warring with adoring on John’s face.

Dave is still shell-shocked from a minute ago, eyes vacant and attention focused inward. He hears the words ‘first date’ and ‘your place’, and that traitorous part of him that always acts on his heart instead of his head agrees enthusiastically to the suggestion before the rest of him catches up, and, and—

He can still feel the heat of John’s nose on his, remember the little ‘clack’ing of their glasses.

“Great! Oh, and, uh, I wasn’t really sure how… how public, you wanted us to be with this, because I get that you, well… _you_ , I really do.”

It’s a straw Dave grasps onto with heady abandon. Their school was as accepting as any large scale High School could be, which is to say… well, it’s an easy picture to get. And Dave’s never really cared about his reputation, he has his niche over here with John and he likes it, but kids are scared enough of him (and if not him then _Bro_ , though he’ll never admit that to himself) not to actually physically beat up on him.

The sneers and whispers would be unavoidable. Dave’s a thick skinned kid, but John’s tender, ivory white and easy to bruise like a southern magnolia—and if Dave kept most of it away from him, let just enough through to rough at the edges of Egbert’s tender heart, maybe the other boy would decide it (this them their relationship, god, they were in a _relationship_ ) just wasn’t worth it.

“I want to be as public as your front teeth do, sticking out of your mouth like that.” John giggles helplessly, still pinked, and shoves ineffectually at Dave’s face.

Rose and Jade, who are unfortunate enough to have to buy school lunches, are walking up now, trays full, smiling up at the two of them with eyes slightly befuddled by the closeness of their bodies.

As though to test his own resolve, Dave leans in and presses his lips to the side of Egbert’s mouth, all slow and gentleman like, coming back with the taste of brown sugar just barely on his lips and a desire to nurture crooning so poignantly in his chest that he doesn’t even notice it’s there.

Their female friends are staring—hell, half of the room is staring, and things go deathly quiet for just a moment before Jade jumps up into the air and starts whooping loudly, dropping her food all over _everything_ and not even seeming to care.

Feferi, a few tables down from them and always bright with joy, is the second one to join the chorus, laughing so melodious and sweet that it’s no wonder a quarter of the student body is in love with her and clapping her hands vigorously. Before Dave knows it, one third of the people in the room are clapping right along with her, clapping and cat-calling, and an emotion that rings like pure vindication overwhelms him before he can stop it.

He supposes it’s the herd mentality again—too scared by the majority to speak against the unkindness when it happens, but invested enough in their idols of popularity like Dave and Fef to express their approval when given prompting.

Looking away, Dave snatches his brown bag lunch from John’s open backpack and peers inside. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a slice of red velvet cake with most of its frosting by now smushed onto the sides of its container, a bottle of apple juice, and—

—a little index card, with a painstakingly shittily drawn Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff-esque picture of himself and John side by side with messy, exaggerated hearts, and the caption ‘where making this hapen’ across the bottom.

Before he can stop himself, he leans in and kisses the side of John’s mouth, just one more time.

John just grins, and grins, and grins.

\---

Amazingly, the rest of the day isn’t as much of a gauntlet as Dave expects—most of the ribbing coming from Jade and Rose (Rose asking for the emotional developments that moved them past the stage of palling and pining to official romantic entanglement, Jade asking for them to kiss again now that she has her camera phone out,) everybody else either too cowardly to comment or sort of very carefully edging around them.

John notices that the kids behind Dave’s past gay-bashing exploits hang their heads and hope he doesn’t notice them as they stroll past. Another thing that shouldn’t make him feel as good as it does.

They climb in Bro’s shitty old truck after school without a terrible amount of fanfare, aforementioned sibling taking one look at their rosy cheeks and close stance before leaning back in his seat and letting his lips thin into an almost imperceptible smile.

As soon as he’s settled into the back, John leans impishly up at the older man, toes pointing inward and eyes bright and crescent-shaped with happiness. “What’re _you_ smirkin’ about, Mister Strider?”

Bro smiles—honest to god _smiles_ , teeth and all, and hums a short note before responding.

“I can see a lot of life in you, is all.”

Once again, Dave means to get on that whole ‘carefully awkward silence’ thing during the car ride, but John ends up saying something complimentary about Nicolas Cage in one of his nervous speeches and okay, Dave simply _cannot_ let that go unchecked.

“Nic Cage and his huge, greasy forehead is about as cool as a flame.”

They bicker all the way to the apartment. In the front seat, Bro turns on one of his mixtapes and whistles along.

\---

For all that they’re calling this a date, it’s really not that unlike their usual ~~daily~~ hangout sessions. John listens to Dave jam, giving him occasional feedback and playing along on the little electric piano in the corner when so inclined. They play video games—Dave is the undisputed master of all the ironically shitty ones, but as soon as they tread out in to legitimately cool platforming territory John kicks his ass.

And if they’re sitting closer than usual while they’re at it, so close Dave can count the freckles in John’s blue eyes, well, he’s not going to be the one to mention it.

(Especially since it would require him acknowledging how badly his plan is failing right about now, so at ease with John like this that it’s a wonder this isn’t what they’ve been building up to their whole lives.)

Before he knows it, it’s ten o’clock at night, and the three of them are crowded onto the living room couch eating the Chinese takeout Bro was gracious enough to order.

Dave’s caught up in a story about some SNAFU a news lady had made earlier in the week, and the fact that she’d tried to laugh it off by saying something along the lines of well, it’s a good thing so few people caught that, this being early morning television and all!

The coolkid smirks, eyes taking on an admiring, far-off look. “And then the internet happened. I love it when the internet happens.”

Behind him, mouth full of chow mein and a half sewn smuppet perched on his knee that in no way takes away from his omnipresent aura of ‘dignified as fuck’, Bro nods in sanguine concurrence.

The night goes by in strange flashes like that, for Dave, until finally it’s eleven, and John’s dad is there to pick him up, and—

—John rushes over to him to return that kissing favor from earlier, before scurrying, giggly, to his car.

Dave is frozen stiff until Bro actually walks up and closes the front door for him, huffing with what would be laughter for anyone who emoted more animatedly.

“You gonna stay up all night writing letters of eternal devotion on Pesterchum now, Romeo?”

Dave flares his nostrils rebelliously and tosses his head, all rolling red eyes and amused irritation under those dark shades.

“Are you _crazy_?”

Throwing his shoulders back, Bro laughs—a rude, brassy sound full of character, rumbling through the air like a bass guitar lullaby. “I’m sorry, is that new news to you? Kid, I’m so crazy I voted for Eisenhower _twice_.”

Bro gives him a bright second to internalize the statement, and then punches his arm lightly when it’s obvious Dave doesn’t get the reference.

“Read more, fucker. I’m raising an educated goddamn gentleman here.”

Dave scrunches up his nose and snaps his teeth once, in a subconscious gesture of irritation, pretending to hate it when one of Bro’s hands moves up to smooth through his platinum blonde hair. There’s a beat of comfortable silence then, before Bro reaches up around his neck to slide the bulky, red and white studio quality headphones off and ring them instead around Dave’s skinny neck.

The younger Strider is speechless for a moment—mouth gently unhinged with disbelief as his fingers reach up to trace the cup of one headphone. Bro seems charmed by the shock, leaning in to brush his knuckles over Dave’s nose in a roundabout gesture of profound affection.

“Nice job with John, dipshit.” The way Bro says ‘dipshit’ turns it into a term of endearment, soft and gentle like you’d hold a hummingbird. “You did good.”

That scares Dave a bit, too—he never wanted this to be _real_ , never thought it could be, that he might get invested in John _that way_ , but…

…he feels like he’s ‘done good’, too. He’s still tracing at the headphones when Bro walks away without another word, pale hands fluttering over the sturdy plastic casing with idle wonder.

Is he… is Bro giving them to Dave? Stupid question, Bro is nothing if not resolute in his actions. He slips them up over the ridges of his ears and plugs them into his ipod with trembling fingers, flicking through his library in search of something that would do the audio capabilities of these things justice. He means to tap on something with a thumping bassline and a rowdy sound, but his finger slips and instead he gets ‘Trust Me I’m a Thief’ by The Guggenheim Grotto.

It’s a beautiful, candid sort of song, and though he initially means to switch he ends up letting it play, enjoying the crooning piano with only half a mind.

His thumb worries at the headphones’ thick cord.

Half a mind, right up until the end. _‘Please be quick and swear forever, we can draw the stars together…’_ John’s bright green shoes had a new scrawling across them, today. Dave didn’t say anything at the time, but it had made veins of molasses warmth seep into chambers of his heart that had been flying under the radar for a long time. **‘ <3 the Coolkid’**

‘Promises break, that's what they do; Scorpions sting, that's what they do; Hurricanes take, that's what they do; Just like I'm gonna steal a piece of you…’

Dave swallows thickly, a lump of guilt he doesn’t want to explain building uncomfortably in his throat.

He switches the song off.


	4. Their Protector

Dirk’s seen this shit happen before.

Shoulders tight, throat constricted oddly, trapping the usually nonstop flow of gentle barbs and nonsensical admonitions that Dave knows are deliberately incorrect, and appreciates the absurdity of, he drops Dave off at school the next morning with a stone in his gut that he can only hope is groundless.

At age sixteen he was in love with a boy, so much like John yet so _different_ —there’s an uncommon give to John that Jake didn’t have, a leniency and a tenderness that shows in his actions, makes Bro worry for him.

But not because John reminds him of Jake.

Because John reminds him of himself. High schooler in love, thinking the weight of the world lay in his secret affections, too scared to ask for anything and even more water-gutted at the thought of pulling away.

Junior year, Dirk had asked Jake to the prom.

Jake had startled. Looked heartbreakingly apologetic. Told him that he was already going with Jane, he’s so dreadfully sorry, chap, he never knew.

It was the end of Dirk’s world for long about two weeks there.

He got over it.

Jake and Jane have had a couple of kids since then. It honestly doesn’t sting anymore.

That’s the way a guy should be let down, be allowed to move on—firm and kind, for all that he hated Jake for it, hated the whole world for it, for a little while there. He grieved and moved on.

But Dave had said yes. Yes to those secret, embarrassing affections, yes to John and his bumbling adoration that had progressed so much farther than a garden variety crush by this point.

A proposal followed by a refusal is a wound swiftly cauterized; free of infection for all that it hurts.

Dirk doesn’t know what to think of Dave’s actions. Doesn’t want to spurn them, imply they’re not genuine—he handed out his warning, that first day Dave told him, and resolved to keep his peace from there on out. He’s not sure he can think of a worse feeling than believing your guardian doesn’t support your choices. If Dave’s being genuine, of course.

That’s the problem, really. He’s been trying to distance himself, to keep his loquacious tendencies out of this fiasco. Telling himself that he’s projecting, that John’s nothing like him, it’s simply not an apt comparison—

( _You’re seventeen and the tears leaking out of the corners of your eyes have formed crusty trails across the lines they’ve abandoned, though they still flow strong down the channels that curve around the messy dripping contour of your nose to drizzle off your chin, stupid stupid dumb dumb you fetishize puppets and she has tits how could you ever have thought you could win this battle—_ )

Much as he loves the kid, reared and sacrificed for him, would kill or die for him, Dirk’s not sure he trusts Dave with loving John.

He’s not sure if that makes him a bad person or a bad parent. Cranking the radio up to eleven, he throws his hat haphazardly onto the passenger seat and sets to driving home, resolving a little to stay out of it and a lot to look after the both of them.

\---

High top sneakers on gum blackened concrete, hoofing it cavalierly through the halls Dave all but owns, and he’s…

…gut wrenchingly nervous.

He can feel all eyes on him, catch the faint motion in the periphery of his vision, of heads swiveling to follow his progress, and he feels like he somehow has something to prove, like he’s never felt around anyone but his Bro, his Bro and John.

Words well up in his mouth but stick to his teeth and the underside of his tongue, refusing to come out into the light.

There are signals crossing in his brain—‘ _Fuck you guys_ ’ colliding with ‘ _Don’t take this shit seriously_ ,’ ‘ _I’m not a fucking fag_ ’ grating violently against ‘ _So what if John and I bump uglies, so what_?’

Dave’s not a homosexual. 

It occurs to him that he doesn’t know why he cares what their opinion on the matter is.

Shuffling cruelly into an underclassman, making them spill their drink down their front, Dave tells himself that he doesn’t, that it’s nerves, nerves and the unpleasantness of the façade, and leaves it at that. He passes a couple of the big guys, the meaty ones, with grades too poor for them to be on the football team and minds too opinionated for them to take any history class without it offending their delicate, bigoted sensibilities, and feels the mal intent cling to him, welcoming it, slowing his walk to a saunter as he smiles cheerily at them.

They know Dave can fight, fight and win, against anyone they throw at him in any combination. The fact that he’s the hardest kid in school hasn’t been up for debate since halfway through freshman year, when the varsity linebacker broke John’s glasses and ended up ass over teakettle with their nose broken in two places on the floor of the gymnasium. They’re too chicken shit to do jack to Dave—they just stand, and stare, and stew in their false bravado that smells too much of cowardice for Dave’s tastes.

John… can’t, though. Fight, Dave means. No, that’s not right. John’s not willing to fight, John freezes up like a rabbit with a broken flight instinct when under threat of aggression, and Dave can’t believe this is the first time that has occurred to him.

He’ll have to remember to keep an eye on him, warn aggressors away with evil eyes from behind dark shades and no-bullshit body language once this whole homo-phase is over.

He never wants to be responsible for John getting hurt, not in a million years.

First period Spanish is perdition, as always, Dave’s cantankerous, child-hating bitch of a maestra stewing over every incorrectly conjugated irregular past tense verb. Zoology and Botany is enjoyable though; there’s a senior named Terezi at his table with a lewd mouth and a hilarious habit of dismissing authority figures by saying ‘I respect that’ and then proceeding to ignore them completely that always manages to keep things interesting, not to mention the rows of dead preserved specimens covering every open tabletop.

English is simply boring—not tedious or unmanageable, just generally uninteresting—they don’t learn much, not in the traditional sense of grammar and syntax, they just read and analyze, read and analyze, every day without variety.

Dave’s doodling nonsensical things on the edge of a sheet of notebook paper, tuning Mr. Dicus out as best he can.

“—page fifty eight in _The Picture of Dorian Gray_ —“

The sketch hadn’t started out as anything, which left Dave a bit bewildered when he looked down and it was suddenly John, in a stupid flying pose, grinning at something off the page. Biting his lip to hide the smile, Dave gives him an absurd looking warhammer, penciling in the details of a classically stupid looking hero costume; he’d like that, Dave knows he would.

“—isn’t you reading too much into it; Basil does have romantic affections for Dorian, though the standard of the times and Dorian’s own demeanor have put him off expressing them—“

Dave decides to draw himself next to him, once he’s finished with a suitably absurd hood; positioning himself so instead of John smiling into nothingness he’s smiling at Dave. 

He’s halfway through going over the billowing folds of his own cape in more detail when he looks down and realizes how close sketch-Dave and sketch-John’s faces are, close enough to share a breath, a sliver away from brushing noses.

Something in Dave’s chest clenches uncomfortably. He wads up the paper and throws it away the instant the bell rings.

By the time Dave storms into the cafeteria, thunderous mood parting crowds around him, John is already nestled comfortably into his spot at their lunch table, sitting sideways, knees pulled up to his chest and thin ankles crossed, smiling as he looks up to see Dave and then making a juvenile face at his overhanging displeasure: eyes crossed, mouth pulling out into something hilariously unattractive.

It makes Dave soften, the same way John always does—guy’s not a pushover, for all that that’s the general opinion of him; he can be an absurd teenage jackass just like anyone else. He’s just an absurd teenage jackass on Dave’s side, and thank discount priced Doritos for that.

“Who pissed in your cheerios this morning, sunshine?” John’s as relentlessly chipper as ever.

Dave chokes back on a snort of amusement, having to physically grab John’s feet and move them in order to sit down. “Fuck you too Bugs Bunny.”

The instant Dave’s ass hits the bench John’s feet are back, perched on Dave’s thighs, ankles still crossed just as daintily as before.

Dave’s waiting for the unpleasant new couple phase to set in with some resignation—that awkward moment when neither of you are sure how affectionate the other wants to publically be, culminating in an age old dance of ‘fuck fuck what do I do fuck’ and hopefully speeding this road back to simple buttsexless best brodom— when John throws a baby carrot at his head. 

Dave catches it mid air, launching it back at him with a delicate flick of his wrist and frightening accuracy, watching with victory puffing out his chest in pride as it flies _into_ John’s gaping mouth. John giggles so hard he doubles over, glasses falling down the bridge of his nose, forehead coming to rest on Dave’s bicep as he cackles, delightful bursts of ‘ha’s interspersed this time not with squeaks but with short, pig-like snorts where his breath catches too fast in the back of his throat.

Dave’s laughing _at_ him for it in the next second, and before they know it (Dave’s not tracking time well, like he always has, this is bad) they’re both hysterical, calming down for but a moment before John accidentally choking on the carrot still in his mouth sends the two of them into more fits.

John chews resolutely, when he can finally breathe again, head still resting against Dave’s arm.

His hair is startlingly soft, softer than Dave could’ve guessed at, with the perpetual state of messiness it’s in.

Jade had broken into laughter when John and Dave had, but Rose had remained sanguine throughout the entire episode, lips pursed, a forebodingly contemplative expression dominating her thin, comely features.

Dave can feel all eyes on him, when he’s finally able to settle himself (stupid, losing your cool like that, you don’t just up and laugh like a loon, you’re not _Egbert,_ ) and it makes that same, frigid sensation he refuses to believe is self consciousness shudder through his shoulders and tighten his jaw.

John is very warm, in all the places he’s touching Dave. Dave is not a homosexual. He grabs John’s chin, tilts it upwards, and kisses him to prove it.

\---

Dave kisses John like a lover, but not the kind you ask first, and it makes something uncomfortable grate against the churning gears in John’s mind, makes him worry that something’s wrong with this picture, this scenario, if he could just see through the haze of mild arousal and major adoration making his quick breaths almost whistle through his prominent front rabbit teeth.

Dave’s looking down at him like he expects John to startle like a bird at a cat convention any second now, to pull away and tell him that was too far, too fast.

John grabs Dave’s ear and pinches. Hard.

Dave’s entire body jolts.

“What the fuck, Egbert—“

“You are the worst at kissing, Dave. It’s you.”

Affronted color floods his face in varying shades of crimson and fuschia, and—this was not what he was expecting, not what he’d _planned_ for; not at all.

“You did not just say that. I’m the bomb at kissing. These lips have launched a thousand ships, baby—“

“ _That_ was not a kiss! That was ‘Dave the nervous douche bag is going to aggressively stick his tongue in John’s mouth in a fit of unexplained panic’.”

Dave looks half-terrified for a moment. John passes it off as more indignation at the kissing comment.

Rose shifts in her seat, and furrows her brow, and files the reaction away for later.

When Dave doesn’t respond, John continues. “What, you thought I’d be your demure, blushing plus one once we got together?”

Without skipping a beat, he leans in, lids dipping and fluttering as he pitches his voice high. “Ooh Mr. Strider Ooh!”

Dave nearly chokes, and smirks broadly—he can’t help it. He’s still trying to fit this into his calculations. John is making it… really difficult.

“You’ve got the shoulders for it, Egbert.”

“Up yours, I’m a picture of manliness.”

“You seriously need to ditch all those fun house mirrors at your place, these delusions of grandeur can’t possibly be healthy—“

“Jackass.”

Dave spreads his arms in a mock-conciliatory gesture. “Lies and slander, I’m the nicest guy you know.”

The smile drips from John’s face a little, expression turning into something that makes Dave feel a little like a guilty kindergartener, even though he doesn’t know what he’s done.

“No you’re not.”

Dave feels—he feels _bad_ , and that’s… a new one. He swallows.

“No, I’m not.”

Thankfully John seems appeased by this, kicking his feet against Dave’s legs and proceeding to talk shamelessly through the massive bite of pizza Lunchables his mouth.

“Pizza ‘nd vidja ‘ames after sch’ll? Ah got th’ Darkness Two ‘esterday!”

John has laced his fingers with Dave’s, and it’s bizarrely, wonderfully intimate.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry about the delay, life has been kicking me in the ass! Updates will be weekly from here on out, but if you ever feel the need to boot me in the behind, my tumblr main is M17UNA!
> 
> Also this story is married to Pavaal on tumblr.


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